Imagine that suddenly you loose power over your body. That you lie in the bed and want to scratch head and you can’t. Even though your hand doesn’t really hurt, you can’t move it more than few cm. As if someone drugged you.

Imagine that you drive your car talking to a friend sitting next to you and suddenly, in one second, your words become mumbling, and when you try to change the gear, it doesn’t feel like your hand, it’s more like log of wood hitting on something. Imagine that after falling down and you can’t get up because you have no power in your leg and hand.

If you think that you can imagine that, you’ve never been more mistaken in your life. My hemi-paresis (of left side) after brain stroke was (and still is) the most awkward I’ve ever experienced, you kind of can move your limbs, but not in a way you want. And they are so weak that you sometimes wish that you didn’t have the them at all.

So many stroke survivors struggle with hemi-paresis. It’s quite different from paralysis, but I guess equally frustrating. It’s a state of „in between”, you kind of can, but really can’t. Your brain can’t guide your hand or leg or only fingers.

When paresis hits you the lack of power over your body is just weird, you notice formerly unnoticeable things. Me myself I feel it as if a bunch of puppeteers sat in my body and pulled strings just to make my moves more difficult.

At some point it’s easy to give up and give all power to the puppeteers. To give up working out, your physiotherapy, but one must cut the strings by working out. I still have problems with my palm and I work out. Time passes and it’s still frustrating, but it’s not worth giving up.